EPA Awards $150,000 for Diesel Emissions Reductions in Ohio

27 March 2007

The US Environmental Protection Agency has awarded a $150,000 grant to the Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission for a cooperative project to cut emissions from public diesel fleets in central Ohio.

An additional $68,924 for the project will come from local sources. The project, called the Mid-Ohio Public Diesel Fleet Initiative, is a partnership of the Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission, the Ohio Environmental Council, the city of Columbus, and the Central Ohio Transit Authority to demonstrate clean-diesel technologies and strategies to reduce diesel emissions.

Vehicles will be retrofitted with diesel oxidation catalysts to reduce emissions, hydraulic heaters will be used to keep engines warm in cold weather cutting pollution from idling engines, and biodiesel will be used as fuel.

The grant is part of EPA Region 5’s Midwest Clean Diesel Initiative (MCDI), a collaboration of federal, state and local agencies, along with communities, non-profit organizations and private companies, working together to reduce emissions from diesel engines in the Midwest.